[X4U] Leopard Issues

[Stroller]

On 2 Dec 2007, at 15:26, Jon Warms wrote:
> ...
> 2) Problem 1: All browsers no longer do "domain guessing".
> I'm connected using Verizon DSL. ...
> Old behavior: the browser
> would automagically add the "www." and the ".com". This is
> a major PITA; had I known, it would have been a show-stopper.

It's debatable whether this is good, correct or even valid behaviour.

I appreciate this behaviour is convenient for the majority of users,  
but hostames don't need to end with .com - I connect to machines on  
my LAN as "compaq", "emachine" and the router is called "pornpipe".  
In fact these machines are all in the stroller.uk.eu.org domain, but  
I believe it's correct for me to be able to address them using their  
short-hostname (domainless-hostname?) - it's certainly valid to have  
one-word hostnames in any case - and it would be a pain for me to  
have .com incorrectly added (and wrong of the o/s to do so).

Any website that requires a www. prefix in this day & age is  
[redacted] stuck in the 90's, dude. Like retro!

> Now, for example, when
> I type "jr" in the address bar (for jr.com, which is J&R) and
> hit "return", the browser loads the Verizon-Yahoo search
> page (with jr.com as the first entry).
> ...
> It's repeatable; and happens on Safari 3.0.4 and Firefox 2.0.0.11.
> Camino works the same way. Strangely, it also happens on an
> old Netscape browser that had been "guessing" fine. While it
> sounds like Verizon is behind this, my wife's PowerBook, right
> next to me on the kitchen table, does domain-guessing like
> Macs always did.

I believe this is indeed a Verizon bug, and blimey!12 seconds of  
Googling confirms this to be the case:
   http://www.google.com/search?&q=verizon+dns

Verizon shouldn't give you a webpage when a DNS request is invalid,  
it should return an error. As far as the browser is concerned the  
webpage has loaded correctly.

I believe you can ask Verizon to disable this "service" but if you  
just want to test then one of the blog entries in those search  
results mentions OpenDNS - changing your DNS settings to that of a  
working DNS server should allow the browser to behave correctly.

Finally, I'd have thought that after you've typed http://jr.com in  
your browser's addressbar just once it'd be remembered in your  
history and that by typing "jr" in there in future it'd be listed in  
the autocomplete box that pops up - I have one site, for example,  
that I access by typing "an",down-arrow,enter, although I have to  
admit that this address is one of my bookmarks, which you may  
consider "cheating".

Stroller.